Free Republic

The crack media buzzed this week with the discovery of a totally front-page, news-breaking, breathtaking videotape. GOP presidential candidate and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, CNN reported, was caught on camera confessing how he "sought 'world domination.'" Gasp! This is something voters need to know. Left-wing rag Mother Jones vigilantly covered the damning film clip and dove into the "eerie" details of Cruz's "five-year plan" in which he "began plotting his path to the White House." The New York Daily News ominously reported that the "unearthed" video showed that "Even when he was a teenager, 2016 contender Ted Cruz craved power."...

Four days after taking the Malheur Wildlife Refuge in Harney County, Oregon, LaVoy Finicum, a 55-year-old Arizona rancher told NBC News that he'd rather die than spend his days in prison. "There are things more important than your life and freedom is one of them," he said in early January as he sat huddled in a blue tarp outside of the wildlife refuge keeping watch with his gun in his lap. "I'm prepared to defend freedom." Finicum told NBC that night that he was staying outside to ensure that the FBI could find him if they came to arrest him....

Lexington, SC is another small town America stop for the Trump steamer. Population 20,905. It's a fitting location after the “battle lines’ Trump and Fox have put up. Why? Let's go back to revolutionary times. The area initially was called Saxe Gotha, but the name was replaced in commemoration of the battles of Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts. Before then, this area stood up to the British in The Battle of Tarrar Springs fought nearby on November 16, 1781. I will post an interesting eye witness account of the battle below. In short, what the British did to these Patriots,...

Commemorated on January 14 Saint Sava, First Archbishop of Serbia, in the world Rostislav (Rastko), was a son of the Serbian king Stephen Nemanya and Anna, daughter of the Byzantine Emperor Romanus. From his early years he fervently attended church services and had a special love for icons.At seventeen years of age, Rostislav met a monk from Mount Athos, secretly left his father's house and set off for the St Panteleimon monastery. (By divine Providence in 1169, the year of the saint's birth, the ancient monastery of the Great Martyr and healer Panteleimon was given to Russian monks.) Knowing that...

All adults, including pregnant women and new mothers, should be screened for depression as a routine part of health care, a government advisory group recommended Tuesday. Depression is a common public health problem, and screening simply involves health workers asking about certain symptoms even if patients don't mention them. The second part of the recommendation from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force is more difficult — ensuring systems are in place to properly diagnose and treat people identified through screening. And the guideline, published by the Journal for the American Medical Association, couldn't determine how often adults should be screened....

Donald Trump wasted no time Wednesday morning fanning the flames of his newly reignited feud with Fox News star Megyn Kelly. "I refuse to call Megyn Kelly a bimbo, because that would not be politically correct," the Republican presidential front-runner said in an early morning tweet. "Instead I will only call her a lightweight reporter!" Trump has taken issue with Kelly since the two faced off in last summer's Fox News debate - the first Republican debate of the 2016 election cycle. Trump's last throw down with "The Kelly File" host was similarly punctuated by the b-word [Aug 24, 2015]....

Prayer is important at Florida's Cambridge Christian School. "We train our students that prayer is foundational to their walk with Christ," Head of School Tim Euler told me. "Our faith is founded in prayer." So when Cambridge Christian faced off against University Christian School last December in the 2A state championship football game, they asked the Florida High School Athletic Association if they could begin with a word of prayer. The FHSAA said no.

During her two presidential campaigns, Hillary Clinton has consistently drawn greater support from women than men. Is this gender lag due to retrograde misogyny, or does Hillary project an uneasiness or ambivalence about men that complicates her appeal to a broader electorate? As a career woman, Hillary is rooted in second-wave feminism, which began with Betty Friedan’s co-founding of the National Organization for Women in 1967, while Hillary was in college. Friedan sought to draw men into the women’s movement and to ally with mainstream wives and mothers. But after a series of ideological struggles, she lost her leadership role...

Natural gas spot prices around the United States are often compared to prices at the Henry Hub in Louisiana. At trading points in and around the Marcellus and Utica shale plays in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio, natural gas prices consistently trade below the Henry Hub national benchmark price. However, the difference between these pricing points and the Henry Hub has narrowed in recent months as new pipeline projects have come online. Most of the natural gas produced in the region is consumed in other areas of the country. With limited infrastructure to deliver natural gas to consumers, the Marcellus...

Texas has lost at least 60,000 upstream oil and gas jobs, plus as many as 250,000 supply chain and retail jobs indirectly, as a result of the oil crash, according to an analyst with one of the top industry trade groups in the state. Karr Ingham, a petroleum economist who compiles the semi-annual Texas Petro Index for the Texas Alliance of Energy Producers, also doesn't expect those losses to stall in 2016. The TPI's estimate of 250,000 job losses in Texas is devised from a multiplier tying upstream oil and gas job cuts to jobs elsewhere in the economy. Ingham...

A teacher in Minneola, Florida is under fire for a lesson in racism she gave to students returning from the Martin Luther King holiday. The teacher, who works at a charter school called Minneola Elementary, conducted a social experiment meant to show her children the dangers of discrimination. One problem: The kids are only in the first grade. Second problem: She didn't clear the lesson with administrators. Third problem: She didn't notify parents until after the lesson had taken place. This trio of problems has her in hot water with parents, to say nothing of Principal Sherry Watts. Watts said...

Filmmaker Michael Moore told Fox News Channel anchor Megyn Kelly "You asked a great question [to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump], by the way. The war on women. God bless you Megyn Kelly" on Tuesday's broadcast of the Fox News Channel's "The Kelly File." Moore began by addressing Trump skipping on the FNC debate, saying, "I feel bad for you." And "What's he afraid of? I'm sitting here. I don't feel any fear. ... Donald, come now, come sit beside me, I'll hold your hand. She's fine." He also told Kelly that she had frightened Trump and "made him run,...

Funny how the market worked fine without government intervention to stop price 'gouging.' With crude-oil prices scraping along at about $30 a barrel--down from about $100 in January 2014--the impact of this free fall on the global economy is still to be determined, but there is no doubt about the short-term winners: consumers. The national average for a gallon of regular gasoline has fallen to $1.85 from $3.94 in April 2012. For the typical American who drives an average 15,000 miles a year, that means an annual windfall of roughly $1,200. One interesting aspect of this major correction is that...

On the eve of Monday's Iowa caucuses, campaigns and super-PACs are due to make an important set of financial disclosures. The reports will at last show how much money the presidential candidates officially raised and spent in the final quarter of 2015, giving a sense of their abilities to sustain themselves through a tough primary season. And the super-PACs, which can raise and spend unlimited amounts so long as they don't formally coordinate with the candidates, will provide the first glimpse of their balance sheets in six months. Here are seven things to watch for in the upcoming fundraising reports....

Tens of thousands of new gun licenses were issued to Massachusetts residents in 2015, continuing a recent surge, according to state data. There were 342,622 active Class A firearms licenses statewide, according to figures provided by the Department of Criminal Justice Information Services earlier this month. That was up about 24,700, or 7.8 percent, from the same time a year ago. A Class A license, the broadest license available under state law and by far the most popular, allows the holder to carry rifles, shotguns, or handguns. It also allows the holder to carry a concealed handgun.

Fox has defended Megyn Kelly's obvious ambush of Donald Trump in the first debate. Now, Fox gets into a pissing contest with Donald Trump, publishes a snide, snarky commentary about him and intends to bring in a Muslim apologist/defender to pick up on the ambush theme. Megyn "had a tough couple of days after the last debate" don't ya know. "Self-inflicted wounds are ALWAYS the most painful and embarrassing." While I've been a Cruz supporter, Trump made the right decision to sit out the debate. As a former infantryman, I wouldn't knowingly walk into an ambush either. Now the ball...

BOB BECKEL: Just remember that Fox did buckle to Trump in another debate. Rupert Murdoch has been against Trump from the beginng. In the beginning he came out against Trump. Now he says who wants to meet one one-on-one with somebody, a CEO to CEO.

Many broadcast hours and column inches are sure to be used today and tomorrow regarding the decision by Donald Trump to skip the Fox News debate in Iowa. Predicatively 90% of those reports will most likely circle around a Donald Trump -vs- Megyn Kelly narrative. Obviously that aspect will be the preferred hook used by Fox News to avoid sunlight; it is also profoundly wrong. Megyn Kelly, and her sidekick Chris Stirewalt are the visible symptom, not the actual underlying issue. Their partnered 'too-cute-by-half schtick' has been ongoing for several months, including the coordinated antics at the last debate, and...

Iran's navy warned a U.S. warship on Wednesday to leave waters near the Strait of Hormuz where the Iranians were testing submarines, destroyers and missile launchers, news agencies reported. The commander of Iran's fleet, Rear-Admiral Habibollah Sayyari, told Tasnim news agency the U.S. ship was trying to collect information in the Sea of Oman - an area close to the Strait, a vital oil and gas shipping route - and said it left quickly after the alert.

It is not uncommon for presidential candidates to pose as hard-core liberals or conservatives to appease their party’s activist base and then temper their views in the general election to win over moderates and undecided votes. But Donald Trump seems to be doing that before a single vote has been cast in the GOP primaries.